


So Small a Turning

by mint_julep



Category: Zootopia (2016)
Genre: Also trying to hold back on the Santa Paws puns, Christmas, F/M, Fluff and Angst, Friendship/Love, Holidays, Not too many Happy Pawlidays puns I promise
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2016-12-25
Updated: 2016-12-25
Packaged: 2018-09-11 22:18:28
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,278
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/9036851
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/mint_julep/pseuds/mint_julep
Summary: Will Nick Wilde ever get what he wants for Christmas?





	

**Author's Note:**

> Merry Christmas, folks! This fic takes liberties with canon, timelines, etc., but I hope it stays true to the spirit of the fandom and of the season.

Amateur hour, they called it. When Nick Wilde and his friend Finnick first declared Christmas scams off-limits, they told each other that it was because no self-respecting con artist would stoop to pick such low-hanging grapes from the vine. After all, were they con _artists_ or con _hacks_?

Of course, sitting out the holiday rush took its toll on the foxes' yearly profits. The old Santa-Paws-With-Bell chestnut, the Dad-Buying-Gifts-at-the-Gas-Station classic, the Little Match Fox... the sentimentality of the season served up one sappy mark after the other to any two-bit swindler. Hell, even the Tundratown Tinsel Tease, when executed perfectly, could rake in enough money to last both of them through the spring.

But Nick and his longtime conspirator didn't have the stomachs for holiday cons. Underneath their patronizing talk of "standards" was a grudging admission that they both did, in fact, possess some form of honor among thieves. That even the most hardened tricksters had boundaries they preferred not to cross.

So the two foxes established their own holiday tradition. Every year, in lieu of gifts, Nick and Finnick bought each other a few rounds of heavily spiked eggnog at their favorite dive bar, Ye Olde Fyxen, and observed only one rule: no talking about the holidays, which was in truth a gift to themselves. Finnick preferred not to think about having epic, knock-down, drag-out feuds with his extended family, feuds overflowing from wounds going so far back no one remembered how they started. And Nick preferred not to think about having no family at all.

\-----

The tavern was almost empty when the friends claimed their usual spots. Now, just one grizzled vixen sits behind the bar, idly stringing olives into a half-hearted garland to pass the time. After a round and a half of cheerless drinking, Finnick finally moves to slide off his stool. Off Nick’s raised eyebrow, Finnick sighs.

”It’s a Christmas miracle, Nick. You’ve made me wish I’d gone home from the holidays.” Finnick glares at his friend’s morose muzzle. “And I can’t stand those bums.”

”You know you love me, Finn,” Nick mutters. "And we can’t break tradition.”

Finnick looks at Nick for a long beat, then pats him on the shoulder. “You broke a lot of your traditions this year, pal. It’s okay to... you know, take some time getting back into the swing of things.” Nick squeezes his eyes shut as he takes another deep pull from his drink.

Then, Finnick gets a mischievous gleam in his eye, jolting Nick out of his reverie. “Hey, enough of that pouty mug. Wanna hit Tundratown for the Tacky Den Tour? Party buses leaving every fifteen minutes out of Savanna Central. Price includes a free flask of wassail, whatever the hell wassail is.”

But Nick shakes his head, drawing his wallet from his back pocket. “Thanks, Finnick. For everything. Maybe next year.” Before dropping cash on the bar, he lifts his paw in a farewell salute. The two foxes know better than to part with a hug, even on a night like this. Especially on a night like this.

“Merry Whatever.”

“Merry Whatever to you, too.”

\-----

Savanna Central was the one place Nick could count on for seeing sadder sacks than himself as the world spun into another Christmas Day. In the wee hours of the morning, settled on a park bench with a bracing hot cocoa, Nick could push down the ghosts of his own holiday fantasies by imagining other people's tales of woe.

Because this was the year Nick dared to think Christmas might be different, for the first time in almost twenty years. A few weeks ago -- for a brief moment before the Night Howlers press conference -- he'd imagined that his Christmas Eve could be spent saying goodbye to Finnick. That he could be packing up his few belongings and heading off to start at the Zootopia Police Academy.

Or that he’d be spending Christmas Eve celebrating having outwit the other cadets -- outsmarted them, outrun them, outfoxed them -- and casually posting an update somewhere that Carrots would see and be proud of.

Or that he might even be sitting against the wall in a drab, grey hallway, talking to her in hushed tones as he snuck in a call before finally seeing her in the fur again on Graduation Day.

A party bus returning from Tundratown rolls into the square, depositing a crew of drunk giraffes. They teeter dangerously as they disembark, laughing and singing Tundratown carols. Nick is so relieved to have their boisterous caterwauling interrupt his thoughts that he feels like throwing his arms around one of their wobbly legs, before considering that if he did so, they might actually squash him.

An inebriated giraffe at the rear mindlessly drops her souvenir parka, only noticing it's gone after she's halfway down the block. She turns, laughs, shrugs, and staggers on down the street with her pack.

Nick senses the arctic fox before he sees her dart out from the alley. He can almost hear her doing the mental computation -- that if she works all night, she could get three coats under the tree before tomorrow morning.

He winces at the parka's garish gold fabric, a pang of empathy rising up for the kits that will have to wear the color each day to school. And then he feels grateful -- still, after all these years -- that the Tundratown Business Association chose black the year his own mother found a parka. Not to mention that, being an only kit, he got three years’ worth of coats out of that old thing.

The arctic fox is gone before Nick even finishes repressing the memory. He looks down at the dregs of his cocoa. Then looks up, and tips his empty cup in a toast to the giant Zootopia Police Department poster plastered to the billboard opposite his bench. Judy Hopps smiles down at him, her violet eyes bright and her smile wide enough to convince any poor soul that joining the ZPD would be the best thing for Zootopia, for all living things, and for the poor soul himself -- the ultimate sappy mark.

Nick shakes his head as he stands up. He never even walks past that poster. Never. If anyone asks, it’s the eggnog that made him take that route home tonight, that made him sit in front of it. A more sober fox would walk miles out of his way to avoid it. But he can't seem to stop breaking traditions anymore.

He even allows himself to Zoogle her name, feeling overcome with nostalgia for years past and nostalgia for a few weeks ago, feeling overcome with eggnog and overcome with trying to stay straight for another damn con-free holiday.

Then, the world seems to stop spinning at what comes up in his Zoogle search: a tiny article announcing that earlier this week, Officer Hopps resigned from the ZPD.

\-----

The first streaks of daylight arc over the bridge when Nick returns to his temporary lair. The morning air is chilly as he settles into his lawn chair, but he's absurdly grateful to live in a part of town where it never snows. One less reminder that it's Christmas.

He rolls Judy's carrot pen in his paws back and forth, back and forth -- as some childish part of his brain wonders if he could conjure her presence with the hypnotic rhythm. He scoffs at himself. It's about as likely as conjuring Santa Paws on the bridge above.

But then he thinks, maybe I'm overdue for a Christmas wish. And he knows that if she did ever come down the chimney, not even a herd of reindeer could drag him away again.

**Author's Note:**

> Title from "All That I Want" by The Weepies; I own nothing.
> 
> Also, for the purposes of this fic, I'm imagining the weather in central Zootopia like Los Angeles -- mostly warm and sunny year-round. So if you want snow at Christmas, you'd have to go to Tundratown, which, during the holidays, develops into Zootopia's version of Times Square on New Year's Eve as a result.


End file.
